July, 2009 archive
They Don’t Report So You Can’t Decide 0
Emails reveal right-wing media efforts to protect Gov. Mark “the Hiker” Sanford:
But they also show something even funnier: an effort by the right-wing media to curry favor with Sanford’s office by dismissing the story as a storm in a teacup created by the liberal media. It’s fair to say that, as news judgments go, it would be hard to find one that turned out worse than this — given the subsequent revelations about Sanford’s Argentinian liaison and his abandonment of his post.
Right-wing conspiracy? What right-wing conspiracy?
Stray Questions 6
Why are the persons who write WordPress plugins so lax about uploading screenshots of what they look like on the front page of your blog?
I really don’t care what it looks like on the backend.
The Internet Is a Public Place 0
We leave tracks.
Here’s where I’ve been, courtesy of web2.0collage dot com (pretty boring, ain’t it).
Dorkazine explains.
In His Steps 0
Emphasis added:
(snip)
Charles Ponzi was also incarcerated at the Atlanta facility, CNN reported. Madoff asked at his June 29 sentencing for masterminding the largest Ponzi scheme in U.S. history to be sent to a medium-security prison in Otisville, New York.
A Day Decade Late and a Dollar Short
0
Potentially big news in the “what you don’t know won’t hurt us” circles of high finance:
(snip)
The antitrust division sent civil investigative notices this month to banks that own London-based Markit to determine if they have unfair access to price information, according to three people familiar with the matter. U.S. lawmakers plan to regulate the $592 trillion over-the-counter derivatives market, which includes credit-default swaps blamed for helping worsen the biggest financial calamity since the Great Depression.
We Need Single Payer 0
A caller to the Diane Rehm show:
Given a choice between a disinterested bureaucrat and an insurance company employee with a fiduciary interest in denying me coverage, I’ll take the bureaucrat.
Republicans Got Nothing 0
Just racism and bigotry. And making the rich richer and the poor poorer.
Really, it’s just not a very nice party.
Via Balloon Juice.
Greater Wingnuttery XXXIV 0
Why does the Republican Party think that the answer to every question is “War”?
Drinking Liberally 0
Tuesday, Triumph Brewing Company, 2nd and Chestnut, Philadelphia, Pa., 6 p. Good food, good drink, good fellowship.
You’re probably safe to attend tomorrow. I have a summer cold that will likely keep me off the road.
Quote of the Day 0
From a comment up the road a piece and to the left.
Spectral Beings 0
Brendan goes ghostbusting:
In light of the latest unemployment figures, there are more persistent questions coming at the administration. Did Obama and his team get it right last winter when they put together their $787 billion stimulus package, or did they undershoot? If they made a mistake, what should they do now?
The guys at the Post must be too busy selling access to lobbyiststo do their homework, because that statement is not even close to accurate. As the AP reported in February, it was the Senate that insisted on a $787 billion stimulus. Obama asked for more than a BILLIONS more. And guess who was the driving force behind the cuts?
Scaling back the bill to levels lower than either the $838 billion Senate measure or the original $820 billion House-passed measure caused grumbles among liberal Democrats, who described the cutbacks as a concession to the moderates, particularly Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., who are under pressure from conservative Republicans to hold down spending.
Actually, Arlen is really neither a Republican nor a Democrat.
He’s an Arlenicanocrat.
Faith Is the Evidence of Things Unseen (Updated) 0
Not the disproof of things seen.
Karen Armstrong writes at the Guardian:
Most other traditions prize practice above creedal orthodoxy: Buddhists, Hindus, Confucians, Jews and Muslims would say religion is something you do, and that you cannot understand the truths of faith unless you are committed to a transformative way of life that takes you beyond the prism of selfishness. All good religious teaching – including such Christian doctrines as the Trinity or the Incarnation – is basically a summons to action. Yet instead of being taught to act creatively upon them, many modern Christians feel it is more important to “believe” them. Why?
Follow the link to read how she answers the question.
We see the disconnect between professed belief and action in the evil and sordid deeds of those who loudly and publicly congratulate themselves on how “Christian” they are; they thereby discredit, not only their own creed, but all creeds.
Comes now the best argument that atheists can muster on the side of disbelief: the actions of “believers.”
Addendum, Later that Same Day:
Speaking of those who pray loudly in the public square, as the hypocrites do . . . . (Via the Booman.)
History Lesson 0
The Booman summed it up so I don’t have to:
The 1930’s brought a deep and abiding minority status for the Republican Party, all of which they spent nursing one form of paranoid grievance or another. In the 1930’s it was red-baiting, foaming about the New Deal, and apologizing for fascism. In the 1940’s, after the war, it was an unhealthy obsession with the Red Menace of Russia and China. In the 1950’s it was all about communist infiltration of the government, Hollywood, and the armed services. From the 1960’s on, it has been about countering the counterculture and fighting the expansion of rights to all our citizens, regardless of race, gender, religion, or sexual preference. Their one decent president in all this time wasn’t even much of a Republican. The Democrats would have happily nominated the Supreme Allied Commander in 1952 if Ike had only agreed to run on their ticket. The rest of the GOP’s lineup has been thoroughly corrupt, if not corrupt and incompetent.
Really, not much has changed. The right is still the right that Richard Hofstadter diagnosed over half a century ago.
They are afraid.
They are afraid of history.
Gun Nuttery 1
An armed society is a polite society. Not.
We Need Single Payer 0
What Susie said.
The point of health care should be caring for health, not lining the pockets of CEOs.
Executive Immunity, Bushie Style 0
John Cole on Cheney and the violation of civil liberties:
(Follow the link to see the links that Mr. Cole refers to above.)
Looking to the future is one thing. Turning a blind eye to evil is quite another.
Evil was done.
In our names.
